One World
by Mara Beth
Summary: A boy meets his favorite artist. Said artist may or may not be basing her stories off of real-world events. A few small pieces set in the Prime universe.
1. Chapter 1

_Thunk._

A stack of comic books hit the table, obscuring most of the little boy's face. He quickly adjusted himself, standing on tiptoe so he could peer over his collection. "Hi, miss, will you sign my comics?"

"Manners," his mother reminded him, tapping his shoulder.

"Sorry! Could you please sign my comics?"

The author smiled, picking the top book off of the stack. "Of course, that's why I'm here!" She opened to the first page, poised her pen, and glanced back up at the boy. "Now, who am I making this out to?"

"Alex!"

"Alrighty, Alex, who's your favorite?"

"Arcee!"

"Yeah? Why's that?"

"She's so cool! And she's a motorcycle! And even though she's little she can still beat any Decepticon she wants to! And I'm little, but I bet I could beat a Decepticon too." Alex beamed proudly. "I wanna be just like Arcee when I grow up. And I want a pink motorcycle that looks just like her."

The author grinned. "Arcee wasn't always pink, you know."

"Really?"

"Really. Here, want to see the first ever drawing I did of her?"

The boy nodded eagerly, bouncing on his heels. The author quickly opened a binder and pulled out a drawing. The color was faded with age, but it clearly depicted a childlike drawing of a blue motorcycle. Hearts and rainbows floated around it, and the blue coloring seemed to have been added as an afterthought. She held it in front of the boy, lowering it so he could see.

He frowned a little. "Blue?"

"Yeah. Blue."

The boy lingered on the old drawing a little while longer before plucking one of his comics out of the stack and flipping open to a page featuring Arcee. A expertly-drawn pink and white motorcycle had just ramped off of a cliff, heading straight towards an unexpecting Decepticon below. He held the drawing up next to the one the author held. "Wow, she's a lot different now."

She nodded and put the drawing back in her binder before signing his comic. "To Alex: The Autobots are proud of you, especially Arcee. Keep doing good things on Earth!" She then signed her name in loopy cursive letters underneath it, no doubt raising the value of the comic. "Signed, Miko Nakadai."

"Thanks, miss!" He scooted the stack off of the table, a few books teetering precariously and threatening to fall. His mother took the load from him, but he snatched the top book and hugged it to his chest. "Mom, I'm keeping this one with me forever!"

"We'll see."

Behind the table, Miko smiled as she began packing up her things, leaving the library table cleared of contents. She made her way out, bag of art supplies in one hand and a guitar case in the other.

Outside, a dark green off-roader waited. She put her things in the back before sitting in the driver's seat. A voice spoke from the radio.

"Pink, huh?"

Miko just shrugged. "Hey, I can either change her color scheme or give away her identity."

"Well, what color am I?"

"You're the same, Bulk. I don't have any reason to change the colors of an Autobot that I 'based off of my car.'" She folded her fingers into air quotes.

"Good, I don't wanna be pink." He started his engine while Miko laughed, mentally plotting a way to work a pink Bulkhead into her next comic. Or real life. Or both.


	2. Chapter 2

**(Added another speed drabble to this. Enjoy.)**

"Miss Nakadai."

Miko looked up, brushing the rough draft papers under some unfinished tax forms. "Hiya, Fowler. What's up?"

He glanced disapprovingly at the scattered art supplies. "We have an information leak." He set a manila folder down in front of her. "I was wondering if you might know anything about it."

She pulled the folder across the desk, moving a few pencils out of the way before flipping it open. Lying before her was her own artwork, pages and pages of comics that she had sold. "Well..." She tapped a pencil against her chin thoughtfully. "This is some very well-done art, if I do say so myself." She gave him a mischievous grin.

Fowler sighed. "This is serious, Miko. _Extremely_ serious. You realize you could be charged with treason?"

"Against who? Earth or Cybertron?"

"Miko-"

"Agent Fowler, I'm doing you a favor." She leafed through the pages he had collected.

"What you're doing is leaking massive amounts of classified information to the public!" He snatched the folder away. "They're not ready for this information yet, and it was extremely irresponsible of you to put it out there."

"I leaked information, yes, but nobody is going to believe it's real! It's a story to them, Agent Fowler. Fiction."

"I have had Esquival purging information from the internet for days now!"

"Well, let Raf know he can stop. They're just talking about comics! He'll never have to replace another picture of any bots online again. People will call it photo manipulation."

He pinched the bridge of his nose, making a mental note to start keeping painkiller with him when he planned on talking with Miko. He could feel a headache seeding itself. "You're suggesting that by telling the public everything, we're hiding the Bots better than ever before?"

"Because they're not a conspiracy now! We've been hiding the Bots for years, but now they're just a story. You could write practically any incident off as a publicity stunt."

"...I'll talk to my people about it."

"Uh, Billy? I am your people." Miko leaned back in her office chair with a smirk. "Agent Nakadai, at your service!"

"Right." Fowler paused for a moment. "You have to tell the Bots about this. And show them everything."

Miko's face fell. "...Show them?"

"Yes."

"Oh man..." She buried her face in her hands. "Arcee's gonna kill me..."

"I'd be more worried about Knock Out. You know how he loves his paint job. Blue doesn't suit him too well."

Miko folded her arms over her head. "Fowler, make sure my will is on file... This is going to be my most dangerous mission yet."


	3. Chapter 3

**(I think this will be the last one. I only intended for the first drabble, but the rest just came tumbling out after it. I don't intend on writing a story with 500-700 word chapters, I swear.**

**Guest Reviewer talkswithwind: No, they are not the G1 versions. Not intentionally. Arcee's colors were just a little homage, I suppose.)**

The Apex Armor was extremely useful, allowing any human using it the ability to breathe while on Cybertron. Miko, it's most frequent occupant, found herself more and more comfortable with it each time she used it.

At the moment, she was extremely uncomfortable, and the Apex Armor could not fix that. In fact, she was half considering deactivating it and inhaling deeply just to get the Bot to quit giving her that look.

"Blue," he muttered, dangerously calm. "...blue."

"It's a... It's a very nice shade of blue."

"It's _blue._" Knock Out crossed his arms, tapping his digits on one of his doors and giving Miko a cold stare.

The girl gulped and wondered if the look could melt even the Apex Armor. It was enough to silence her usual banter towards the mech.

"Do I look _blue_ to you?" He gestured to his chestplate.

"It was to conceal your identity, and to help the readers differentiate you from..." She trailed off awkwardly.

"'Decepticon' isn't a swear word." He looked almost amused. "I take no offense to being reminded of former allegiances. What I DO take offense to is being BLUE." He spat the final word like it was bad energon.

"It doesn't even look bad!" She snipped. "It might even be an improvement."

"An improvement? AN IMPROVEMENT?!" His digits clenched into fists. "Why, you little-"

"Oh look! There's the bridge! Adios Doc Knock!" She turned and sprinted through the portal, putting off the medic's wrath for the time being.

The rest of the team was waiting for her.

Ratchet, she noted, was extremely focused on the bridge controls. She thought he was hiding a smirk, but it was difficult to tell. He was well aware that his design had hardly changed at all, as there was no need to hide an ambulance.

A few others, however, were less than pleased. Arcee had her arms crossed and was fixing Miko with a cold stare that was almost as terrifying as Knock Out's. Bulkhead watched her from near the main console. Smokescreen and Bumblebee weren't there yet, but frankly, Miko wasn't surprised. For the fastest cars around, they had an issue with being on time anywhere.

"Alright, Miko. Ultra Magnus and Wheeljack are supervising a reconstruction project at the moment. You might as well explain yourself to everyone currently here." Fowler leaned on the railing, situated a few yards away from Ratchet's shoulderplate.

She took a deep breath and began. "Well... I was just... documenting your adventures?"

A growl from Arcee's direction. "With quite a bit of artistic liberty."

"Arcee, I-"

"MIKO!"

"Oh, no, what now?" Miko hid her face in her hands.

Smokescreen and Bumblebee roared into base. Both transformed and landed on either side of her, nearly knocking her off of her feet. "This is AWESOME!"

Very carefully, she peaked between her fingers. "...What?"

Smokescreen very carefully sat down one of Miko's comic books and used one digit to flip the pages. "Check this out! See how cool I look in blue and silver?"

"Hey!"

"You look cool too, Bee! The new stripes work for you." Smokescreen began miming punches and kicks. "Even when I'm not kicking tailpipe, I'm still kicking tailpipe! Even if it is just in a comic."

"I like this one best. Look how many Cons I'm fighting on this page, Smokescreen!" Both sportscars were grinning and doing their best to flip through the tiny pages without tearing them.

Miko looked up and saw Arcee smiling. "I'll bet I've got more than you, Bee." She paused and looked at Miko. "And... maybe pink isn't half bad." She shrugged, glancing at her accented wrists, then joined Bumblebee and Smokescreen in comparing fictional battles.

Miko grinned, gathering up the scattered comic books. "Maybe not."


End file.
